iTunes Exclusive Episode Mandela Long Walk To Freedom

The following is a sooner orgator production.
Good morning!
Joe, stop!
I got ready for the jam.
I said I got ready for the jam.
Yo, G, kicking drum is complete!
Joe.
Joe.
Good morning!
Greetings!
If you are listening to this, it means a couple of things.
Number one, it means it's time for another iTunes exclusive!
Episode of the Clubhouse podcast.
Number two, it means you subscribed to this show on iTunes, which we greatly appreciate.
If you just, people that just listen to the live show, although we appreciate them too, they don't get these iTunes exclusive!
That we do every once and again.
The Clubhouse podcast is all up in the ears.
My name is Rob.
I'm feeling pretty good, not gonna lie to you.
Joining me for this iTunes exclusive is the official fact checker of the Clubhouse podcast.
By the way, it's live every Sunday night at 7 Eastern 4 Pacific.
But that only is the official fact checker of this show.
Not only is this Twitter fan handle fun, Don Go.
He's also a guy that's going to help me review a movie today.
But his mama call him Don Ford. I'm gonna call him Don Ford. Don welcome.
Thank you so much for having me, Rob.
Always an honor, sir.
I love your intro. It's in, of course, the music.
Right?
You know what?
I gotta keep you on your toes, sir.
But the day before we recorded this particular iTunes exclusive, we were honored to be invited
by our friends at Allied Integrated Marketing to a screening of Mandela Long Walk to Freedom.
starring the great Idris.
Is it Idris or is it Idris?
Idris.
I don't know. I'll be honest with you.
I'm gonna go with Idris because it just sounds cooler to me.
I don't know.
Directed by Justin Chadwick, who you might know is for directing movies like the other
Berlin girl.
He directed some episodes of M.I.5, which is a British series.
East Enders also a British series.
And some Shakespeare shorts as well.
As the title suggests, this is the story of Nelson Mandela based on his autobiography.
I want to say this up front.
This is a long film. It's two and a half hours long.
Two twenty one if they remember they said that together.
Right.
When you go to the movies with trailers and everything else.
Yeah.
Play on spending about two and a half hours.
So let's start with the story.
Of course, obviously it's true story.
It's based on the autobiography of the Great Nelson Mandela who actually passed away
a week before this episode was recorded.
A very kind of jarring to me.
Even though he was 95, you know.
I mean, a great man who fought for racial equality in South Africa when there was none.
And when I say when there was none, I'm not talking like 50s America.
I'm talking like the 80s.
Which is really weird.
Which is behind the curve is a mild way to say.
Big time behind the curve on that.
You see his struggle.
You see his wife's struggle all the way up until his presidency.
So let's start with the story itself.
Don, what did you think?
Well, forget it there.
I want to also think people in Alight.
We hand in everybody.
Josh.
Thank you.
That's a great job.
I got to think of every show that they invited us to.
Absolutely.
But the story.
I'm really twisted on this movie.
This is really weird.
I don't know if twisted the word you made.
Kind of kind of, I got a lot of emotions on this movie.
The thing that really got me up front was that his passing right before this movie came out.
I find kind of just weird.
You know, it's a coincidence.
I'm leaving the conspiracy theory all the time.
Yeah, but I just think it's kind of interesting.
How they, you know, he passes right before.
So I think this is going to give this movie a big push because he just passed.
I really thought they would have added something maybe to the tail end of it.
But there he had the movies out a lot of before.
You know, they had a week though.
I mean, they could sometimes take it these movies a week two weeks before.
And maybe there will be an extra print sent out before it releases.
Because this movie releases on Christmas day.
Exactly.
The movie, I, the storyline, I liked and there's some things I didn't like.
I, okay.
I thought, let's talk about the story itself first before we go to the film overall.
The story, like I said, it shows the struggles of Mr. Mandela through the presidency.
No, through his life.
Through his life through the presidency.
It ends with him.
Be impressive.
Be coming president.
I, there were some things they admitted in his life that they did not have in a film.
But you know, two and a half hours, some big things to cover.
Yeah.
80 years.
Exactly.
So they're, I understand.
I'm not going to be spoiler free as usual on this.
But I wish they would have done more of him as even the president.
Because his struggle in prison is incredible.
But even his struggles as of being the president with the rugby situation and all
those.
There's a lot of more struggles instead of just the prison.
I thought it was too much of the prison.
Oh, you, you and I spoke about this last night.
Yes.
And for me that didn't bother me because I looked at it from the aspect of, that's probably
where the book ended.
Yeah.
So they only wanted to cover the material that was covered in the book.
Because if you want to do with the rugby thing, you know, they probably took
the logic of Invictus is already out there.
And by the way, if you have not seen Invictus starring Matt Damon and Morgan, if we're
going to be directed by Clint Eastwood, do yourself a solid.
It's a great film.
Loved it.
Well, I think the still the story alone was good.
I, I, I, on this storyline, it kind of reminded me of Gandhi.
I don't know why.
I remember you saying that last night as we were watching the screen.
Which one?
Of course, one best picture about Mohammed Gandhi.
It's kind of like the struggles in the life and the good, the bad.
It showed a lot of the bad.
It showed some good.
Um, my one gripe.
I think maybe they got a little too political in the storyline, possibly.
Okay.
I can say you can see that.
I really was intrigued by the storyline because I mean, I know the story of Nelson Mandela.
I kind of grew up when he was released in 1990.
I was in high school.
You know, I remember through the 80s hearing about apartheid in South Africa.
You know, Lisa Weapon 2 is one of my favorite movies of all time.
And it kind of deals with, on the South South Africa.
So I knew, I'm comparing one to the other, believe me.
But I kind of grew up in that era.
You know, I grew up in a household where we watched the news every night.
It was part, it was part of dinner.
You watched news or in the dinner hour.
Nothing else.
You watched, but the news in the violence and shoot out of everything.
So I was still, but I was still intrigued by the storyline watching how it developed.
It does move very fast.
So, you know, people need to be aware of that.
This movie that the story does for two and a half hours, you're covering almost 80 years.
So, and 27 years in prison, they probably spend what 40 minutes probably of him in the movie.
Better part of an hour, it was about half the film.
It was because you had to understand what he went through in the prison.
And there's a scene in the film where Nelson is talking to a man who's of the current generation in the 80s.
And what they're dealing with versus what Mandela dealt with it in prison.
And that's kind of that generational gap.
And it's, I thought that to be a very, very powerful scene.
Because it showed you the difference in the generations and how he was saying, you know,
I'm looking at the pool.
By the, by the gate.
No, by the, by the fence.
Oh, I just, yeah, yeah.
And he was, when he was working with it to me.
I understand, oh, yeah.
So, so let's go from that into the acting again,
Intersellable, one of the great actors of our time.
If you've never seen the wire do yourself a solid.
He plays one of the greatest villains in the history of television as string or bell.
Also, I'm going to hold off on this.
I'm going to kind of bury the lead a little bit.
What did you feel about the acting of the film?
I did like it.
I thought the acting was incredible.
And you know, the, he played Mandela.
I think he did incredible job on it.
But I only had one gripe, really.
Okay.
He was too tall for the guy.
Well, if you understand, you want to put a guy who could play the part and make him,
you know, like you said, when we talked about him being a bigger guy.
But that's kind of like, I just kind of found a weird a little bit.
I don't say, and I hate it.
I mean, the guy didn't care about job playing Mandela.
But it's kind of like putting horn swallowing the play, you know,
Jack and the being socket and him put horn swallowing the giant, you know.
I just found like a little bit weird.
He says just under six foot three.
Yeah.
But I, um, I thought the lady who played Winnie Mandela.
I don't, I want to get to that here in just a minute.
Overall, the girl who played his daughter and the role she did as the eldest daughter.
And kind of, you know, the her visiting him in prison.
And that wasn't very credible scene.
There's a lot of incredible scenes.
There's a lot I liked about this.
Uh, is there's a lot of just stuff I found weird.
But the acting I'd give a really good, real good, you know,
marks for acting except I just found this weird piece.
Kind of a big guy when you think of Mandela's this guy is kind of not that tall.
I loved the performance.
The performance by Naomi Harris playing Winnie Mandela.
Oh, yeah.
I was completely sold by her.
I could see her getting a best actress nomination.
Possibly because to me, she immersed herself in that role.
I did not see the girl.
That's money penny and skyfall.
You know, that's yeah.
I didn't see that.
I saw Winnie Mandela.
And she, she played it with such passion that it was, it really did.
It, it affected me because I was like, wow.
I don't have a problem with Idris Selba.
I love Idris Selba.
His actor was incredible, too.
I'm saying that.
Right.
No, but what I'm saying is here, here was my, here was my thing now.
And this is, maybe the first time in my life that this has happened.
At no point did I see Idris Selba.
And a very few points that I see Nelson Mandela.
It was the weirdest thing for me.
Like, if you close your eyes, it's dead on.
He had the addiction and the voice of Nelson Mandela down.
Like, it was beautifully spoken.
There were certain times what I saw Nelson come through in him.
But it wasn't consistent for me.
And I don't know if it's a makeup issue or what it was.
But I didn't just, but I also never saw it as being Idris Selba.
And that's the only way I can describe it.
It's not a bad thing.
But it was just weird for me.
And on a certain level.
At certain points in the film, I thought maybe this could have been more convincing
if this had been an unknown actor.
But I don't know that that would have made a difference.
It was a strange dichotomy for me.
Again, he did a great job.
I don't see him being nominated for awards for this film.
But he is one of the great actors of this generation.
And I think he did a fine job.
But I don't know that it was stellar.
Again, close your eyes.
You can't tell the difference.
He had the voice down.
That started acting.
You know, the guy played Mandela, his daughter.
But when the after go back to that, because there's one point I wanted to make.
That her acting was.
The appearance was a beast in this.
Mandela makes a point in the movie saying how she kind of changed.
But do you know what?
I saw the change in her too.
Yeah, that was very cruel.
You saw the development of winning her big time.
He turned, she's this sweet little social worker.
And how when she goes to prison and comes back spend 16 months in solitary confinement.
How it changes her.
And you see it when she makes the speech right outside of her of their house.
When she gets out of the car to go in to see her daughters.
And it was amazing.
I cannot say enough great things about her performance.
And she will be playing this money penny in the next James Bond film.
And I'm probably not going to see when you Mandela when I see that.
Because I thought she did an amazing job in this film.
And she doesn't get a nomination of some form out of this.
I will be sad.
Fearless.
This actress for supporting actress possibly you never know.
No, that that'll be best actress.
And she's not that's not a supporting role.
That's a lead role.
Let's talk about director Justin Chadwick and his vision for this film.
I, the one my grandpa, I thought it was kind of a little too political.
But they did a good job of putting a lot of information in that amount of time for the history of that of Mandela.
So I thought his directing was very good.
The scenery, how either they show by of clips or they re-enacted clips to make it look like it was 1985 on TV.
Agreed.
I know.
I have, except for Ed just felt it was a little too political.
I thought the directing was very good.
At one time Tom Hooper, director of the King speech and ladies was attached to the project.
I thought Chadwick did a very good job.
I thought visually it was beautiful.
He really captured the time.
There wasn't a time.
Like again, I was immersed in what I saw.
I believe that I was watching something that was happening in the 40s and the 50s and the 60s and the 80s.
The set design beautiful.
Some of the steady cam shots.
There's a shot as you're following a young man who's lit a, a, a, a, a Molotov cocktail.
You're watching him.
You're following him race through the city and between all the flat to anything.
And it does get a little disoriented.
But that was what the purpose of it was.
He kind of felt like you were there.
Yeah.
And it would definitely stir things in you.
That I think that Justin Chadwick really as, as to use a sports analogy.
He coached him up.
You know, he, he prepared his actors and he prepared his crew for that film.
I think that.
With this movie, I know if it has or when it will hits out the Africa, some of the people who live through this.
It's going to hit home, I think.
It does.
It, it felt real.
I was there when that happened.
I remember, and this is pretty.
And this, you know, it's kind of like the World War Two veterans who see, saving
Pride and Ryan in that first battle scene at the beginning.
You know, they, they really brought back the motions and stuff.
So I have real no qualms about that on the directing at all.
It was not disappointed in the end at all.
I thought, like you said, the scenery, the, the picture, everything was about 1000 credible.
Okay, so let's go now to the final analysis of the film.
The way we rate films on this show is, you know, we don't do numbers.
We don't do stars.
There's no thumbs up or thumbs down.
Because the empire deserves better.
That's right.
Our empire, our fan base deserves better than that.
What, the way we do it's, it's a two-pronged process.
A question one is, would you see this film again?
And if the answer to question one is, no, then we leave it line where it is.
But if the answer to that question is, yes, then the question becomes,
How would you see this film again?
Would you see it in a theater first run?
Would you see it?
Uh,
Imagine a matinee?
I lost my turn to thought there.
Would you see it on video?
Would you see on HBO?
Would you see it in second run?
So I suppose the question to you, sir.
Would you see this film again?
Yes, and I would see it myself personally.
Probably something like HBO, or something like that.
Okay, so you would see it again.
Yeah, but my recommendation to everybody out there is,
I would recommend it as a matinee to everybody else.
Okay, I want to give the Empire even more.
I'd like to give it even more.
Right now, Rotten Tomatoes has it at just under 60% which is just below fresh.
The audience 75% of the people that have of the 61 140 people that have seen it liked it.
I would see this again.
I would see it in a theater, I think, but it would be a matinee.
I'm not sure that I would pay 15 bucks to see this film.
I would recommend to people if you're going to a movie and you want to watch a good movie based on historical fact.
Based on the life of a great man and a man who I hold in the highest of regards.
Go see it at a matinee.
It's a good discussion piece.
As we've had quite a few movies on these.
iTunes exclusive that we've said are good discussion pieces and this is one.
My question.
What was this rated this movie?
The PG 13.
Oh, let's see.
I do not see a PG 13.
I think possibly there might be some teachers out there somewhere who may.
When this comes out on DVD, may show it in some history.
This would be a good.
Yeah, this would be a great tool for it to show in a history class.
Or you'd have to take a couple of three days to do it if you were going to.
Exactly.
Because the running time is 139 minutes.
139.
So two hours and 19 minutes.
I really enjoyed this film.
I'm kind of looking forward to see how it does at the box office.
Because the only trailers I've seen are either a.
Nothing but trailers or very quick spots or hasn't been a big push for this film.
But then again, it's not Christmas.
We've got another week and a half.
It opens.
So expect to push, you know, the weekend before probably it will be already out by the time you hear this.
But go see this film.
I enjoyed this film.
For some families, they might for Christmas film.
They're looking for something like this kind of genre.
I think it'd be good fit if you.
Because there's going to be a course.
A lot of the big Christmas holiday in Oscar push time.
And everything like that.
This is the big time for the Oscars and a lot of the blockbusters come out.
This time is just aware.
But I think I think I'll do good on Christmas.
Especially since Mr. Mandela just passed.
You know, right.
And I just read a little bit of it said that they were about to have the premier in London when
they found out he passed.
But they didn't tell anybody in the theater because they want to do them to enjoy the film.
Yeah.
So, all right.
Well, let's do the plug.
Shall we?
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We are live every Sunday, 1970s from Fort Pacific.
Thanks to our friends at Allied Integrated Marketing for giving us the opportunity to screen this film.
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Don.
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And Jules Womack is wherever she wants to be, whenever she wants to be there.
We want to thank you again for joining us for this.
I choose exclusive.
Tell everybody you know, subscribe to the show on iTunes.
So in case you missed the live show, it will automatically download to you.
So until next time, for done for the Empire, I'm Rob.
The clubhouse is closed.
The preceding was a sooner orgator production.
Get it loaded!
Why?
Because I have to.
Go.